WashingtonMonthly.com blogger Steve Benen (Political Animal, 8/12/09) has words for corporate pundits lambasting Barack Obama's "Attention to Detail" as "going "into the weeds":

A few weeks ago, MSNBC's First Read had an item questioning whether President Obama "knows too much" about healthcare policy. The piece complained that the president is willing to offer Americans details about reform....

The Wall Street Journal's Jonathan Weisman raised a similar concern today, arguing that Obama cares too much about policy details....

This, apparently, is criticism, not praise. The president who inherited a devastating economic crisis is interested in U6 numbers--a measure that includes the unemployed, those who are working part-time but want full-time employment, and those who've simply given up--and this, we're told, is somehow evidence of excessive interest in detail.

Benen thinks that too-skeptical-for-the-Washington Post Dan Froomkin "has this just right" when writing that "there are all sorts of legitimate reasons to be concerned about Obama's approach to governing" but "intellectual curiosity is one thing journalists in particular should celebrate, not sneer at."

In Benen's closing thoughts he really "can't help but wonder if" reporters might simply "prefer a more superficial president because they have a more superficial perspective?"

James Rainey of the L.A. Times (10/22/08) quotes a colleague dismissing the size of Barack Obama's crowds as an indication of the Obama campaign's chances in November:

"Fall Out Boy gets crowds this big," Jonathan Weisman of the Wall Street Journal said at the Miami rally, referring to the pop punk band. "But I don't think they are going to end up in the White House.

"You can't learn anything about the outcome based on how big the crowd is," Weisman continued. "These are the people who are already convinced."

Of course, this is silly--you don't compare the size of political rallies to rock concerts, but to other political rallies, and compared to other political rallies, Obama's are quite large. But does Fall Out Boy really get crowds as big as Obama's?

Weisman reported that the Miami rally drew 30,000. A few moments of Googling turned up this from a South African music blog:

And then came FOB. From song one to the last song an hour and a half later, they rocked and rocked and rocked a bit more. They played only one show in SA and last night was it. They also noted that the Jo’burg concert will be the biggest crowd that they play to the entire year. I think there were close to 20,000 people in the audience.

According to the blog, then--and I have no reason to believe that its any less accurate than the Wall Street Journal--the biggest crowd Fall Out Boy played to last year was one-third smaller than the crowd Weisman attributed to Obama--which was not a particularly big crowd as Obama rallies go.

It's reminiscent of the argument made by right-wingers that an Obama rally in Portland that drew 75,000 was preceded by a free concert by The Decembrists, so the turnout didn't really reflect Obama's drawing power. Fans of the band pointed out that a typical Decembrist show will fill a club with a capacity of 1,200.